Why Edtech Companies Spend Six Figures to Find the Right Name

Aug 4, 2014

WHAT'S IN A NAME?asks Steve Kolowich of The Chronicle of Higher Education. Apparently, a lot—so much that some edtech companies are forking over $50K to branding agencies to find a name that impresses “skeptical academics.” But brands matter in an industry highly driven by political correctness as education; John Katzman, founder of Princeton Review and 2U, told Kolowich that he has “learned the sexual and all the other definitions of Noodle,” the name of his new company.

Here are some high-profile (re-)branding in the past year:

Remind101 has dropped the “101” and is now simply Remind (We can only wonder how much they paid for that domain.);

John Danner, co-founder and former CEO of Rocketship Education, dropped 6 figures for rights to Zeal.com;

After a rough year, publicly-traded company, K12 Inc., re-branded a significant part of its online education services as Fuel Education